ISTE 2017: Build A Computer And Go On A Minecraft Adventure With Piper

ISTE 17: Piper Is A Computer Kit For Kids Ages 7-13 That Lets Them Build A Computer, Go On A Minecraft Adventure and More!

With 572 exhibitors at this year’s International Society of Technology in Education conference (ISTE), we saw a bunch of great STEAM/STEM driven project kits. They ranged from robotics kits, to coding kits, and even kits that allowed students to build their own computers. Piper is one of those kits.

Designed for kids aged 7-13, Piper teaches kids the fundamentals of computer programming, engineering and putting a computer together. Piper, available at Barnes and Noble, Toys R Us and other fine retailers along with the company’s website, promises to teach kids to build a computer from over 100 parts and a real engineering diagram. Kids will be able to build and program with immediate results. Then, kids can take the raw parts and create new projects.

The kit comes with everything for any 7-13 year old to put together a computer, including a Raspberry Pi 3, a display, a power supply, control buttons and a wooden case that snaps together for the computer. After the computer is built kids will find LibreOffice a document creation software suite, Rapberry Pi Edition of Minecraft, A web browser and even the Scratch programming software so kids can learn the fundamentals of programming in an easy to use and understand block programming language.

The entire Piper experience is aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards and Common Core, which makes it a great computer kit for the classroom.

“I love Piper because it represents what enabled me to do all the great technology things in my life” Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak says on the company’s website. Not only that but Piper claims that even Elon Musk’s children are big fans.